Post War Libya - Where is it Going ?

[C. Flower]

I think I read something like that in Orwell's 1984 Cass.

I thought you disapproved of the militias and would be pleased.

[Sam Lord]

Very hard to know exactly what has gone on here. Tens of thousands reported to have demonstrated in Benghazi and militia bases have been overrun. On the face of it a desire for stability and peace.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/23/wo...compounds.html

There is a big clue in the article to what it is all about:

The White House praised the Benghazi protests .....

The counter revolution is in full swing. The oil supply will be protected.

[C. Flower]

There is a big clue in the article to what it is all about:

The counter revolution is in full swing. The oil supply will be protected.

Carried out by the people who just carried out the uprising in Benghazi?

Over ten thousand unarmed people are reported to have overran the militia headquarters last week - these "revolutionaries" who have a very counter-revolutionary history. The destruction of the Sufi shrines and on the US Embassy were rejected by the majority.

They are sick of the Government giving tacit support to the militias by failing to develop state forces and allowing them bases and letting them provide security and religious policing to hospitals. Even in Deema, which is their main base town, these people were pushed out of 2 bases.

Will of the people

Friday's protest underlined the lack of popular support amongst civilians for Ansar al-Sharia, and militias in general.

Libyans had already sent a similar message to ultra-conservatives in the July election, in which the ultra-conservative party led by Abdelhakim Belhaj, who had led the LIFG, did not win a single seat.

Hundreds of Gaddafi's most vocal opponents were further radicalised after joining fellow Muslim fighters in their US- and Saudi-backed fight against the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s.

In the 1990s, the returnees began raiding security forces supplies to arm themselves. They founded the Libyan Islamic Fighters Group [LIFG], and the fight against Gaddafi intensified.

The veterans of this now-defunct movement were integral to the 2011 revolution, forming militias including the Abu Salim Brigade, the Omar Mukhtar Brigade and Rafallah el-Sehati. Ansar al-Sharia emerged, in turn, from these brigades.

New partners

The rift between these ultra-conservative fighters, whose leaders faced intense repression during Gaddafi's rule, and the members of the former Libyan leader's military and political establishment, who defected to join them, continues in the post-Gaddafi era. Both sides participated in the revolution as allies, and yet have very different visions of what Libyan society should look like. The first clue of the depth and complexity of the divide within the rebel movement came with the murder of their leader Abdel Fattah Younis in July 2011. Incidentally, his ultra-conservative suspected killer was broken out of prison a few weeks before the attack on the US consulate.

The militia leaders were initially US-backed, socially and economically reactionary petit-bourgeois types, who went along with NATO. The Gaddafi defectors included those most in favour of the changes of the economy to the neoliberal model pushed by the US and UK. Real revolutionaries in Libya have a hard, long road ahead of them.

[C. Flower]

There is a big clue in the article to what it is all about:

The counter revolution is in full swing. The oil supply will be protected.

I'm not bothered about relying on the good faith of "Josh Earnest" White House Spokesman on this.

It is very murky as to who is backing the extreme reactionary militias, carrying out destabilisation across Africa who are being opposed by local populations who want none of them.

They say they are handling security, but what security do we have?” said Ashour Bentaher, a political activist in Darnah, where residents have struggled to shake the city’s reputation as a hotbed of militancy. “There are assassinations, there are bombings, kidnappings — what security?”

“We do not want to be like Somalia,” he said.

Meanwhile, the report says that the Libyan Government is soft pedalling on the militias.

[Count Bobulescu]

Sensitive documents left behind at American mission in Libya

More than three weeks after attacks in Benghazi killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other Americans, sensitive documents remained only loosely secured in the remains of the U.S. mission on Wednesday, offering visitors easy access to delicate details about American operations in Libya.

Documents detailing weapons collection efforts, emergency evacuation protocols, the full internal itinerary of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens's trip and the personnel records of Libyans who were contracted to secure the mission were among the items scattered across the floors of the looted compound when a Washington Post reporter and a translator visited Wednesday.

Read more at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...7eb_story.html

[C. Flower]

Sensitive documents left behind at American mission in Libya

Read more at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...7eb_story.html

Well, well. No more worries. Reports today that US army boots are on the ground at the Embassy and FBI taking charge of anything sensitive.

[Sam Lord]

Moussa Ibrahim has finally been captured more than a year after the fall of Gaddafi.

He was apprehended trying to flee Bani Walid which has apparently been under attack by pro government forces for 4 days now.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/...rticle4626133/

[Sam Lord]

Khamis Gaddafi is also reported killled in the fighting.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012...-walid-muammar

[Count Bobulescu]

US lawmaker exposes Libyans to danger.

House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) compromised the identities of several Libyans working with the U.S. government and placed their lives in danger when he released reams of State Department communications Friday, according to Obama administration officials.

Issa posted 166 pages of sensitive but unclassified State Department communications related to Libya on the committee's website afternoon as part of his effort to investigate security failures and expose contradictions in the administration's statements regarding the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi that resulted in the death of Amb. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.

"The American people deserve nothing less than a full explanation from this administration about these events, including why the repeated warnings about a worsening security situation appear to have been ignored by this administration. Americans also deserve a complete explanation about your administration's decision to accelerate a normalized presence in Libya at what now appears to be at the cost of endangering American lives," Issa and Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) wrote today in a letter to President Barack Obama.

But Issa didn't bother to redact the names of Libyan civilians and local leaders mentioned in the cables, and just as with the WikiLeaks dump of State Department cables last year, the administration says that Issa has done damage to U.S. efforts to work with those Libyans and exposed them to physical danger from the very groups that had an interest in attacking the U.S. consulate.

"Much like WikiLeaks, when you dump a bunch of documents into the ether, there are a lot of unintended consequences," an administration official told The Cable Friday afternoon. "This does damage to the individuals because they are named, danger to security cooperation because these are militias and groups that we work with and that is now well known, and danger to the investigation, because these people could help us down the road."

http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/po...ng_with_the_us

[Spectabilis]

Yesterday's New York Times has a piece on the role of the CIA on September 11th in Benghazi. Two CIA security officers died and are named here.


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/02/world/africa/cia-played-major-defensive-role-in-libya-attack.html?hp

[Count Bobulescu]

Yesterday's New York Times has a piece on the role of the CIA on September 11th in Benghazi. Two CIA security officers died and are named here.


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/02/world/africa/cia-played-major-defensive-role-in-libya-attack.html?hp

Part of the reason for this, and several other similar stories yesterday is that the CIA released new information. It is thought that the release was in response to Fox News who have been beating the drum every day that there is a "coverup" and that Obama or someone close to him ordered the CIA to "stand down " and not attempt to defend the Ambassador/Consulate. There's a good discussion of the issue on the "international news" link posted in US media.

[Count Bobulescu]

ARTICLE OF THE DAY - WSJ A1, "CIA Takes Heat for Role in Libya," by Adam Entous, Siobhan Gorman and Margaret Coker: "When the bodies of Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans killed in Benghazi, Libya, arrived at Andrews Air Force Base after the Sept. 11 attack, they were greeted by the president, the vice president and the secretaries of state and defense.

Conspicuously absent was CIA Director David Petraeus. Officials close to Mr. Petraeus say he stayed away in an effort to conceal the agency's role in collecting intelligence and providing security in Benghazi. Two of the four men who died that day, Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty, were former Navy SEAL commandos who were publicly identified as State Department contract security officers, but who actually worked as Central Intelligence Agency contractors, U.S. officials say. The U.S. effort in Benghazi was at its heart a CIA operation, according to officials briefed on the intelligence.

"Of the more than 30 American officials evacuated from Benghazi following the deadly assault, only seven worked for the State Department. Nearly all the rest worked for the CIA, under diplomatic cover, which was a principal purpose of the consulate ...
The CIA's secret role helps explain why security appeared inadequate at the U.S. diplomatic facility. State Department officials believed that responsibility was set to be shouldered in part by CIA personnel in the city through a series of secret agreements that even some officials in Washington didn't know about. It also explains why the consulate was abandoned to looters for weeks afterward while U.S. efforts focused on securing the more important CIA quarters. Officials say it is unclear whether the militants knew about the CIA presence or stumbled upon the facility by following Americans there after the attack on the consulate. ...
"At one point during the consulate siege, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton telephoned the CIA director directly to seek assistance."

--THE CIA STRIKES BACK I - N.Y. Times A4, "C.I.A. Played Major Role Fighting Militants in Libya Attack," by Eric Schmitt : "Within 25 minutes of being alerted to the attack against the diplomatic mission, half a dozen C.I.A. officers raced there from their base about a mile away, enlisting the help of a handful of Libyan militia fighters as they went. ... C.I.A. officers joined State Department security agents in a futile search through heavy smoke and enemy fire for Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens before evacuating the mission's personnel to the apparent safety of their base, which American officials have called an annex to the mission. Mr. Stevens was one of four Americans killed in the attack." http://nyti.ms/Vi4UIc

-THE CIA STRIKES BACK II -- WashPost A1, "CIA rushed to rescue envoys in Libya siege," by Greg Miller: "The CIA rushed security operatives to an American diplomatic compound in Libya within 25 minutes of its coming under attack and played a more central role in the effort to fend off a night-long siege than has been acknowledged publicly ... The decision to give a comprehensive account of the attack five days before the election is likely to be regarded with suspicion, particularly among Republicans who have accused the Obama administration of misleading the public by initially describing the assault as a spontaneous eruption that began as a protest of an anti-Islamic video. U.S. officials said they decided to offer a detailed account of the CIA's role to rebut media reports that have suggested that agency leaders delayed sending help to State Department officials seeking to fend off a heavily armed mob." http://wapo.st/YvpUtG

--THE CIA STRIKES BACK III -- "U.S. says CIA responded within 25 minutes to Benghazi attack," by L.A. Times' Ken Dilanian: "CIA security officers in a Benghazi post responded within 25 minutes to a call for help from a nearby State Department compound after it came under attack Sept. 11, officials said Thursday, seeking to refute a Fox News report asserting that CIA managers ordered them to stay put. In releasing a detailed timeline of CIA actions that night, senior intelligence officials have put aside long-standing concerns about revealing the extent of the agency's presence in Benghazi in order to push back against what officials say are baseless allegations that aid was withheld. ...

"Fox News asserted in a story last week that CIA managers had ordered agency security officers to 'stand down' and remain in their own facility, known as the Annex, when the attack on the diplomatic compound began about 9:40 p.m. and that there was an hour delay before officers disobeyed orders and went to help repel the attack that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and State Department officer Sean Smith. Among those who rushed to help was Tyrone Woods, a former Navy SEAL who was part of the CIA security team and who later died in the attacks." http://lat.ms/Qaz3rz

[C. Flower]

Extraordinary if true, but somehow, not surprising. Nobody in Benghazi in the militias seems to know who carried out the attack on the US Embassy - some think pro-Gaddafi people, others, an islamic militia.

"Fox News asserted in a story last week that CIA managers had ordered agency security officers to 'stand down' and remain in their own facility, known as the Annex, when the attack on the diplomatic compound began about 9:40 p.m. and that there was an hour delay before officers disobeyed orders and went to help repel the attack that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and State Department officer Sean Smith. Among those who rushed to help was Tyrone Woods, a former Navy SEAL who was part of the CIA security team and who later died in the attacks." http://lat.ms/Qaz3rz

Mary Fitzgerald's article covers the various contending militias, that all seem to want Sharia law, but to a lesser or greater extent, in the new Constitution, and also discusses the unarmed opponents of the militias who have confronted them and overrun militia bases in protests.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/article...ehind_in_Libya

[C. Flower]

US State Department slated over Benghazi.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/world/america...r-Libya-attack

[C. Flower]

British Government has adviced British Citizens to leave Libya.

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/w...-1226561366887